Jungle Jim (TV series)

Jungle Jim is a 26-episode syndicated adventure television series which aired from 1955 till 1956, starring Johnny Weismuller, as Jim "Jungle Jim" Bradley, a hunter, guide, and explorer in, primarily, Africa. The program should not be confused with Ramar of the Jungle, but is based on the Jungle Jim comic strip created by Alex Raymond and Don Moore. Starring with Weismuller were Martin Huston as Jungle Jim's teenage son, Skipper; Dean Fredericks (also known as Norman Fredric) as Haseem, the Hindu manservant, and Neal, a chimpanzee from the World Jungle Compound, as Tamba. Paul Cavanagh played Commissioner Morrison in nine episodes.

Background

Produced by Harold Greene, the series was filmed by Screen Gems (now Sony Pictures Television), a subsidiary of Columbia Pictures. The program aired in 158 American media markets and in thirty-eight other nations.Earl Bellamy directed the first four episodes of the new series. The series capitalized on the popularity of Weismuller, who had just completed his last film of Tarzan, the jungle character created by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Jungle Jim was a low-budget offering that relied heavily on stock footage and was not renewed beyond its original episodes.

Jungle Jim

Jungle Jim is the fictional hero of a series of jungle adventures in various media. The series began in 1934 as an American newspaper comic strip chronicling the adventures of Asia-based hunter Jim Bradley, who was nicknamed Jungle Jim. The character also trekked through radio, film, comic book and television adaptations. Notable was a series of films and television episodes in which Johnny Weismuller portrayed the safari-suit wearing character, after hanging up his Tarzan loincloth. The strip was created by King Features Syndicate in order to compete with the popular United Feature Syndicate comic strip Tarzan, by Hal Foster.

Characters and story

Illustrator Alex Raymond and pulp magazine author Don Moore created the original strip as a topper to run above Raymond's Flash Gordon. Jungle Jim and Flash Gordon were launched simultaneously on January 7, 1934.

Unlike the protagonists of Tarzan, Ka-Zar, Kaanga and other comics with jungle themes, Jim Bradley was based in Southeastern Asia rather than Africa, and he was a hunter rather than a wild man in a loincloth.

Jungle Jim (serial)

Jungle Jim (1937) is a Universal serial film based on Jungle Jim, the comic strip by Alex Raymond.

Plot

Two safaris enter the African jungle intent on finding a white girl who is the heiress to a fortune. One safari, led by Jungle Jim, wants to make sure she gets the news that she is now a rich woman and escort her back to civilisation. The leaders of the other safari want to kill the girl so they can try to get hold of her inheritance themselves...

Cast

Production

Jungle Jim was based on Alex Raymond's Jungle Jim comic strip.

Chapter titles

See also

References

Jungle Jim (film)

Jungle Jim is a black and white 1948 adventure film directed by William Berke and written by Carroll Young. It is based on Alex Raymond's Jungle Jim comic strip and was distributed by Columbia Pictures. It is the first picture in the Jungle Jim series that consists of sixteen films originally released between 1948 and 1955. In 1954, Columbia turned over its Jungle Jim rights to its television subsidiary, and in the last three films of the series Weissmuller's character is named "Johnny Weissmuller" instead of Jungle Jim. Devil Goddess (1955) was the last entry in the series, as well as being Weissmuller's last feature film.

Plot summary

This is the first adventure of Jungle Jim, an African guide and hunter.

Main cast